"When noise is the default, silence is what catches attention." - Amy Dentata

Monday, June 6, 2016

Critical Switch: DMC3 as Habitual Game

Devil May
Cry 3 is, admittedly, a pretty strong argument for the sort of
mechanically based analysis that I usually stay away from. Actually, it’s kind
of frustrating. It’s a spectacular audio/visual piece that insistently breaks
the tone and continuity of its world to have characters speak utterly silly
dialogue and give you things like grades
and points and you pick up orbs and all the rest of those sorts
videogame-y things that make someone like me cringe. It also happens to be one
of the best videogames I’ve ever played so . . . you win some you lose some I
guess?

I’d love to try sometime, but at least for today I’m not going
to be talking about Devil May Cry 3
as a piece of dramatic text. So I guess for today I’m calling a truce with
formalism.

For today I simply want to talk about it as an action game,
because, given that the discourse is currently dominated by an action game of a
brutally difficult nature that I do not enjoy which shall remain nameless, I
feel like I can contribute to that discussion by talking about a game whose
approach to difficult gameplay is, in my opinion, much more mature and thought
out with gamers in mind.

First of all, and this has been the subject of a lot of
discussion lately, Devil May Cry 3 actually has
difficulty modes, which is important for a number of reasons, including one
I need to come back to later, but for right now it’s most important to
acknowledge that it means the developers knew that different types of people
would want to play this game for different reasons.

Second, the game always forces a break, both when you die and
when you succeed. Every time you die, the action on the screen pauses before
giving you three options.
Continue: Would you like to start from right before where you were, get right
back into that difficult fight? (It’s worth noting that this almost always
starts from basically right where you left off, given that short iteration
cycles are a proven method of preventing frustration.)
Restart the Mission: Maybe you feel like you didn’t play so well earlier and want
to give it another shot, or maybe you just wanna hype yourself up with some
easier combat before giving another go at that boss fight?
Main Menu: Do you need a break? Are you done for the day?

You get a similar set of options when you finish a mission, when
it asks you whether you like to go to the next mission, replay an earlier one,
or go back to the main menu. DMC3 know
it’s an intense game, and it also understands that being psychologically
well-rested is key to playing it well.

As well, while at first glance, the style meter and mission
grading system feels somewhat judgmental, it is a way to encourage curious
players to come back to the game. It creates a visual metric by which one can
judge their growth as a player, a form of digital, external validation that
self-improvement in many other types of genres tend to go unnoticed.

So, in contrast to many other difficult games, Devil May Cry 3 is a game that is not
indifferent to your playing it. DMC3
is not just designed like a habitual game, it’s also built like a game that
recognizes our want to make a habit out of it, consistently rewarding player
growth with ever increasing difficulty levels, new costumes, new playable
characters, and thus becomes a game that gets an exponentially increasing
amount of playtime out of what is, if you want it to be, still a relatively
brief experience. It’s very emblematic of the design philosophy that guided
some of the biggest hits on the PlayStation 2 in that way.

And I think the caring, encouraging nature of its mechanics
(which, for better or worse, were also reflected in the carefree nature of its
text) has shaped the community of truly dedicated Devil May Cry players in an important way. The famous Truestyle
competition really wasn’t a competition at all, but really more of a
non-judgemental talent show, with the competition’s third year featuring every
character and playstyle equally, and where the community voted on their
favorite videos in every category, but wisely avoiding trying to pick an
overall “winner” of the event. In their own words, they decided fairly quickly
that trying to find out the best DMC player was a fool’s errand, and to this
day, the PhantomBabies website still features every video submitted for every
category of the contest’s third year. And I think the contrast that shows with
modern gaming communities speaks for itself.